Page 54: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (September 1998)

Contact Bird-Johnson Company for all your Naval Propeller requirements (both surface ships and submarines), vvaterjet propulsion systems, control systems, and propulsion systems engineering analysis. Bird-Johnson Company engineers are standing by to discuss your application. Call, write or fax today.

ULS[!jEIN

BIRD-JOHNSON COMPANY

An Ulstein Company 110 NORFOLK STREET, WALPOLE, MA 02081-1798 USA

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INTERNET: www.ulstein.no and www.bird-iohnson.com lar, and as a consequence of the

Metra Corporation's plan to divide its major interests into three sepa- rate, listed groups, Wartsila NSD is set to become part of a new diesel and gas engine company.

Draft terms for the demerger are expected to be completed by

October this year, with a view to implementing the reconstitution of the group's various industrial activities, comprising specialized steel manufacture and bathroom products, along with engineering, some 12 months later. The fact that Metra Finance, the wholly- owned subsidiary which acts as the group's internal bank, will form part of the new engine con- cern will no doubt strengthen the latter's capabilities to offer com- plete solutions for marine propul- sion and power generation pro- jects.

How the spin-off and quotation on the Helsinki Stock Exchange will influence future policy remains to be seen. 'Full-liner'

Wartsila NSD, embracing the design, manufacture, licensing, sales and servicing of Wartsila and

Sulzer engines from 500 to 66,000- kW, is presently owned 87.8 per- cent by Metra, the balance of 12.2 percent being in the hands of

Fincantieri, the owner of the for- mer New Sulzer Diesel. With a buoyant order intake so far this year, Wartsila NSD expects that 1998 will show a substantial finan- cial improvement on last year, when sales turnover was FM 11.3 billion.

The recent contract intake has notably included the first marine applications for the Wartsila 64 design, the world's most powerful medium-speed engine. While the opening order involved a 12-cylin- der version for use in a new, com- bined-cycle power station at

Vaasa, in Finland, it is understood that the breakthrough deal in the maritime market arises from a

Finnish newbuilding contract at a

German shipyard.

The remarkable Wartsila 64 design offers an output of around 2-MW per cylinder from a compact envelope, and its NOx exhaust gas emissions have been kept below

IMO-prescribed levels without penalizing competitive consump- tion performance.

The Vickers Group of the U.K., prop-8 MR/EN Marine Propulsion Supplement • September 1998

Circle 348 on Reader Service Card containerships witnessed so far this year. Significantly, confirmed customers have all previously employed the RTA84C design, the market leader in boxship propul- sion. In the meantime, building blocks for further strategic devel- opments of potentially major sig- nificance have been laid by an industry which has fostered a high degree of consolidation and collab- oration in recent years. In particu-